Grantville Group Protests Phony Projects City Wants to Complete

The Grantville Action Group has challenged various redevelopment projects that the City claims should go forward, even with the abolition of redevelopment agencies. After that abolition, various cities created Enforceable Obligation Payment Schedules, made up of projects that they insisted should go forward because of previous legal commitments. But the worst-kept secret in the state is that many if not most projects on these lists should not qualify. Dr. Brian Peterson of Grantville, through lawyer Craig Sherman, today (April 25) protested to the Oversight Board for the City of San Diego, successor to the Redevelopment Agency (the city council), that a bunch of these projects should be rejected. Among the projects that don't belong on the list are City of San Diego debt, convention center cooperation agreement, ballpark cooperation agreement, various street agreements, a Grantville affordable housing plan based on expected tax increment that won't now eventuate, and numerous other projects. The Grantville Group argues, in effect, that these projects are ones the City hopes to do, but has no obligation to do.

Comments

Somewhere (probably Tierrasanta), Jim Madaffer is smiling. He tried to ram Grantville redevelopment down the throats of local residents, and only by the doings of people like Brian Peterson and the Grantville Action Group, has the city been mainly thwarted (at least for now) in their attempts to "revitalize" Grantville and Allied Gardens. And why is CCDC even paying for Petco Park? It was supposed to be paid for with TOT revenue by all of the ballpark-area hotels that were supposed to have been built--oh, wait, the city allowed John Moores and JMI to change the terms of the MOU to allow less hotels and more (empty) condos instead. Hopefully, the oversight board will reject some of these projects; if not them, perhaps the state will chime in and say no to the EOPS.

Agreed: Dr. Brian Peterson and his Grantville group have done yeoman work fighting the redevelopment scam. In re Petco: in the ballot argument in 1998, ballpark advocates claimed that the deal would be revenue neutral. The TOT tax would supposedly throw off enough money to service the bonds. Didn't happen, obviously, partly because the hotels weren't built. Later, the grand jury interviewed bureaucrats who admitted they had been pressured by the Golding/McGrory administration to juggle the numbers to make it look as if the TOT revenue would pay for the ballpark. The ballpark is now a $15 million drain on the City, according to the latest budget. Best, Don Bauder